//------------------------------//
// Chapter IX 
// Story: Relinquish the Sun 
// by Error732 
//------------------------------//

Inkstain heaped another saddlebag's worth of scrolls onto the pile.  There were easily thousands of them coming in each day, delivered from every settlement in Equestria.  Progress reports on defense preparations, requests for royal aid, military deployments, resource estimates, and letters from concerned subjects littered the floor beside Celestia's throne.  Inkstain redirected the bulk of them to the relevant administrative departments, but she could not legally open any missive bound with the royal seal outside of the princess's presence.  There were, unfortunately, few limits on who could employ such a seal or for what, so Celestia herself had to look on as Inkstain picked through them.

"The mayor of Dodge Junction has enclosed several letters from concerned citizens.  The first of them concerns . . ." Inkstain trailed off as she skimmed the lengthy scrawls.  ". . . the rising price of apples, the difficulty of conducting a winter-wrap up should the war persist until then, and the concern that this pony's neighbor may be working for the dragons."

Celestia looked up from her own reading long enough to say, "Assure them that we will consider their concerns as we plan future defensive measures."  Inkstain filed the letter into the largest of several sorted bins, where one of the court's many scribes plucked it up to begin drafting a reply.

The throne room's normally regal atmosphere had faded with the wartime directives.  Though the room was still colossal, it was filled with not only letters but with ponies, all but bumping into one another as they set about their many tasks.  Rows of scribes scratched away with ink and quill at form letters on the Princess's behalf, at copying and summarizing incoming reports.  Pages hustled in and out, sending completed letters off and bringing unopened ones in.  Guards, in greater numbers than they'd ever been, patrolled the room and checked any incoming papers or packages before they could be brought to the Princess's presence, and, in the process, created a tiresome bottleneck for the pages.  Alongside the growing line of messengers was a constant stream of servants who refilled empty inkwells, swept up papers blotched with discarded first drafts, and fussed over the occasional blot on the royal carpets.

Celestia herself read at a meticulous pace; any letter that reached her demanded careful study, confidentiality, or both.  Fortunately, there were relatively few of these, and she presently had finished the last of them.

The mountain of incoming dispatches stood high, despite all diligence.  "I'm sorry, Inkstain, but I don't think we'll be done for quite some time.  Perhaps another hour here before we continue with the day's agenda."

Inkstain rolled up the scroll in her hooves and replied, "We don't have the time to spare, actually.  You're overdue to speak with . . . our guest."

Celestia's stomach shivered inside her.  A part of her had hoped that the priorities of war would override her obligations to Cocoon, but a sterner, more dutiful part injected guilt into her veins.  She owed Cocoon her company.  However unpleasant the conversation would be, it must be had.

"Remain here, and see to what correspondence you can.  I'll go to see our guest alone."

Inkstain started at the suggestion.  "It's my responsibility to aid you in all things!  I should go with you," she exclaimed in a nervous whisper.

"I'll be perfectly fine by myself.  There's no need to repeat the trauma of your last experience with her," Celestia whispered back.

But Inkstain was unmollified.  "I'll be fine, really!  Please, I don't want you to go alone.  I'll worry more if I'm not there."

"But I will worry more if you are.  And we have plenty of work to keep you busy," said Celestia, returning to a normal volume as she gestured at the endless parchments beside them.  "I promise I'll be back soon."

As she rose from her throne, the clamor of paper and quill halted.  All present bowed as their monarch exited, save for the two guards assigned to her person, who escorted her out.



Cocoon lay in the far corner of her cell, blanketed in shadow.  As Celestia entered and dismissed the guards, Cocoon staggered to her feet and approached the bars.  "Princess Celestia!  I thought I might see you today."

Cocoon's appearance did not support her attempt at cheerfulness.  She sauntered toward Celestia on legs unsteady from idleness.  Her mane was unkempt, her tail ragged, and her chitin dull.  Most noticeable of all, holes pocked her body from head to hoof, as if somepony had drilled straight through her in places.  Grotesque openings as wide as apples pierced her legs, wings, and even horn.  Ghastly though her appearance was, Cocoon herself paid them little attention until she saw Celestia's eyes.

"I apologize for my appearance," she sighed with unsubtle irony, "but the food you've provided me doesn't quite nourish.  I guess your prison chef doesn't put love into his cooking."  She cackled as she motioned to a bucket of stale oats.

"Your condition is unfortunate," said Celestia, "but ethical concerns prevent me from supplying you with your normal diet."

Cocoon rolled her eyes.  "Of course they do.  I just know you discussed the matter extensively with each and every member of your council, and you've just come running down here to apologize for the food service."

"The council—"

"Knows nothing of me, I'm sure.  You don't trust them to not trust me.  I'm a well-kept secret."

After their last conversation, Celestia had expected a more polite exchange.  Then again, she wasn't sure how polite she herself would be after prolonged captivity and starvation.  She began anew, "The council is busy with other, urgent matters."

Cocoon leaned forward, and the smile vanished from her face.  "The war with the dragons."

"Yes."

"You're planning to fight them; you shouldn't.  Let me help you."

Celestia puzzled over this apparent attempt at humor.  "I didn't think changelings were gifted dragonslayers.  What could you do that Equestria can't?"

Cocoon scoffed.  "Plenty.  Though not from behind these bars.  I'd take care of the problem alone, but I'm not exactly in peak form these days."  She held up a foreleg and eyed Celestia through a hole in her hoof.  "Anyway, I'd have you along.  I assume you'd want to supervise."

"Supervise what?"

"A mission to save Equestria."  Cocoon wore a smug grin.  Her face advertised that, whatever her plans were, she wouldn't be divulging them from this side of the bars.

"Why would you help me?"

"The dragons are as much a threat to us as they are to you.  My kin wish to join Equestria, remember?"

Celestia decided to be frank.  "I don't trust that you do."

"Why not?"

Celestia's next words bore all the weight of an executioner's axe.  "Because you feed on love."

"Doesn't everypony?" asked Cocoon, dismissively.

"Ponies do not impersonate one another to feed off of the affections of loved ones."

Cocoon smoldered behind the bars.  "If Changelings were not killed on sight in your lands, perhaps they wouldn't either.  And what is a changeling really 'stealing' by entering Canterlot with the face of a pony from Appleloosa?"

"An identity.  A name and reputation."

"Not if no one recognizes the borrowed face.  We make own our identities.  Our appearances are ancillary."

"Even if that were true, your presence weakens all unfortunate enough to love your borrowed forms.  You're parasites of the most important emotion that ponies can share."

Celestia's words brought out a genuine anger in Cocoon.  "What are you saying, then?" she shouted.  "That we're morally obligated not to exist?  That we should all drown ourselves for your convenience?  We didn't choose our natures.  Should we die for them?"

Her voice rang against the stone walls.  Celestia waited for the last echo to subside.

"Perhaps," she muttered.  She regretted the word immediately; it connoted less compassion than she would have liked.  Internally, she strived to justify what she was about to say, but no line of reasoning could convincingly cover her dissonance.  "I have to leave you here.  Equestria will never accept changelings while the dragons persist."

Cocoon sunk to the floor.  She said, in a low voice, "I didn't come here to vilify you.  I came here to save my sons and daughters, to lead them home.  Everything I knew of you gave me hope that you could see reason.  That you could see our suffering.  But you won't even accept my help, much less our worth."

Celestia didn't answer as she left the room.